Summer Polo Camp 2015
Malta Arena Polo Club went abroad for the first time to join a summer polo camp. Our club is made up of Maltese and foreigners, and we like to encourage our members to travel abroad to play polo too. It helps improve your game to be able to play against a number of different people and to, now and then, experience different teaching methods.
5 of our members attended a polo camp at Rugby Polo Club in the UK. Rugby Polo Club is based in the Midlands in the UK at Onley Grounds Farm, near Dunchurch. The club was re-established in 2000 by the Baker Brothers, with the original club was formed in 1893 by the Miller brothers and was one of the biggest and most prestigious clubs in the country at that time, boasting the King of Spain and the Price of Wales as members.
Rugby has a grass pitch and one of the biggest arena clubs in the UK and has a very active tournament schedule. There are also a number of instructional courses and it was the August Polo Camp that our members decided to attend. This was a weekend long event, with about 6 hours per day in the saddle with training, lessons about tactics and rules and finally finished off with a match in mixed teams for the ‘Kangaroo Cup’.
The members stayed locally in a B & B so that they were able to fully immerse themselves into a weekend of polo.
The intense training certainly reaped dividends, as there is quite an improvement in the playing skills of the participants upon their return. We are looking forward to our next trip to the UK and other opportunities to travel throughout the year.